Social Icons

Pages

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. -- C S Lewis

Twitter

Twitter Watch

Below are some interesting accounts on Twitter, provided here for entertainment or informational purposes only. We do not own these accounts nor do we necessarily endorse any of the content appearing hereafter. We certainly do not endorse the Root of All Evil's tweets.

Tuesday, 17 July 2012

Super Twat of the Month - July 2012 (Part 2)

Super Twat of the Month - July 2012

July's Super Twat is Dr Anna B. Gilmore, MBBS, DTM&H, MSc, MFPHM -
Professor of Public Health & Director of the Tobacco Control
Research Group at the University of Bath.

War of the Wikis

On 1st June 2012, the Tobacco Control Research Group (TCRG) at the University of Bath launched their Tobacco Tactics wiki. The head of TCRG is of course Anna Gilmore. The purpose of the wiki, they claim, is "to provide up-to-date information on the
Tobacco Industry, its allies or those promoting a pro-tobacco agenda." (We have written about the wiki previously here.)

As one casually peruses the wiki, it is evident that almost any person, business or organisation that has publicly disagreed with tobacco control legislation is included on the "naughty list" located under the Organisations and People heading.

While some of the categories are certainly suspect and overreaching, it is the inclusion of bloggers and libertarians to the naughty list that is particularly irksome to us. What purpose, exactly, do these two entries serve if not as an attempt to publicly malign private individuals as paid stooges for Big Tobacco?

Discontented with attacking tobacco companies and the people who work for them, it seems that the tobacco control industry has now chosen to smear anyone at all who disagrees with their views. But what it really looks like to us is that Gilmore is upset that there are bloggers out there who don't agree with her, so they too must be added to the wiki in some sort of personal vendetta against them, possibly.

Whatever her reasons for including bloggers and libertarians, it is simultaneously laughable and concerning that those entries indicate money was spent on researching Companies House for information about the bloggers' business activities. For instance:

Puddlecote says he runs his own transport business, yet there is no "Puddlecote" listed as a Director at Companies House.

The obvious fact that Dick Puddlecote writes using a pseudonym is apparently lost on the researchers. Moreover, that statement makes it clear that Dick does not work for tobacco companies, so he was added due to his opinions about the people who work in the tobacco control industry and seemingly because he's also a libertarian.

Another thing we take issue with is the total lack of transparency of edits on the Tobacco Tactics wiki. Why for instance are the edit summaries hidden and the edit histories scrubbed?

If this is genuine research by academic researchers, then why are the majority of editors on the wiki anonymous?

(Of the few names that are not anonymised, we wonder if the user account "Sally Chesworth" is for the same person who is a BBC radio producer. And if so, why would a person in the media need a user account for the wiki?)

We cannot help but wonder why the Tobacco Tactics wiki is so secretive in its edits. Is it to protect the various editors from direct legal action, perhaps? We don't know. Nevertheless, we remain highly suspect of Gilmore's intentions for this site. Indeed, the entries are often biased, sometimes whimsical in its presentation of certain individuals, and sometimes inaccurate or misleading when attributing what they deem as threats by certain bloggers like Frank Davis.

Amusingly, the creation of Gilmore's wiki of shame had yet another unintended effect. To borrow the phrase from Newton's third law of motion, "To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction," the reaction to Gilmore's wiki was the creation of another wiki site called Tobacco Control Tactics*. The opposing wiki describes its purpose as follows:

TCTactics aims to provide up-to-date information on the Tobacco Control Industry, its allies and those promoting the extremist anti-tobacco agenda that no longer targets just tobacco but ordinary adult consumers who use it.

[*Full disclosure: We have been granted a user account at the TCTactics wiki, however we have yet to add any content to the wiki, for which we also apologise.]

The TCTactics wiki was not funded by any tobacco companies or "pro-tobacco" organisations or "front groups" and it certainly received no money from the taxpayer. The wiki was created by ordinary citizens all over the world who are weary of the tobacco control industry distorting the debate about public health whilst continually harassing adult smokers.

And while the disclaimer on Gilmore's wiki says Smokefree South West "had no input into the research reported on this website or its conclusions," we have to wonder if that statement is factual.

Steering in the Right Wrong Direction

We mentioned in part 1 of this post that getting funding for your research is paramount. So how did Smokefree South West come to fund the Tobacco Tactics wiki? To be absolutely honest, we really do not know. But we find it most curious that one of Dr Anna Gilmore's "on-going roles" is being a member of SmokeFree South West's Steering Committee and Programme Board, a position perhaps she inherited from Linda Bauld after she left Bath.

An advisory committee usually made up of high level stakeholders and/or experts who provide guidance on key issues such as company policy and objectives, budgetary control, marketing strategy, resource allocation, and decisions involving large expenditures.

Well, this all seems a bit incestuous to us. Gilmore sits on the steering committee which quite possibly determines who gets funding for research projects and campaigns like plain packs. We have had difficulty locating any information on-line about this particular steering committee, e.g. all who sit on it, but perhaps we missed it -- we could find nothing on its website or via Google searches. To learn more, perhaps we'll need yet another freedom of information request to see if it's really some kind of star chamber-like committee operating under the auspices of Big Pharma and its own devious plan to force nicotine replacement therapy on every smoker out there.

We note that the Tobacco Tactics wiki lists both Eveline Lubbers and Andrew Rowell as managing editors, but we think it unlikely that Gilmore has no editorial influence whatsoever on the wiki. So is it accurate to say that Smokefree South West has no input on the wiki when in fact a member of the NHS's organisation is responsible for the creation of the wiki?

We admit we do not have the answer. But it looks all kinds of dodgy to us.

Those Non-Existent Slippery Slopes Exist

As we come to the end of this epic post about Dr Anna Gilmore, we feel obligated to point out again that all of the tactics and techniques she learnt from doing her tobacco control work are now being used for alcohol control too. Go on and download the conference programme and see for yourself. All of the items that were discussed at the conference are illuminating, but we liked this one the best:

Should we consider managing the retail environment and product
marketing as ways of combating tobacco and/or alcohol use? What effect
do restrictions on product displays, product content disclosure, or
tighter packaging and labelling rules have on consumption?

Dr Anna Gilmore is of course moving into alcohol control because ... well, we think Dick Puddlecote said it best here last January:

Having just about squeezed UK and EU tobacco control budgets dry with
her trademark 'torturing of statistics for hire' consultancy provision
(motto: no job too small, no untruth too big), she is now offering her
services as an expert in other areas.

Do we really need to say any more about those non-existent slippery slopes? We think you get the picture just fine. Anna Gilmore apparently gets it.

In Closing

Because this post is long enough, there are a number of things about Dr Gilmore we didn't cover. Like her role as European Editor for Tobacco Control magazine, the very same journal where all of the so-called peer-reviewed research ends up. Nor did we mention her role with RedPharma as a member of the Trial Steering Group. We didn't even mention that Pfizer and Novartis seem to sponsor many if not all of the tobacco and alcohol control conventions -- and of course they have absolutely no vested interests in ensuring their products are used and promoted by tobacco control and the NHS. Right?

Despite our omissions, we feel we've said enough for now. So we offer our congrats to Dr Anna B. Gilmore for obtaining the dubious honour of Super Twat of the Month. Congratulations, madam. You've earned it in spades.